Telescope with a difference

Tasmania has joined the biggest GPS network in the southern hemisphere with the launch of a new telescope.

The 12 metre dish at Cambridge near Hobart is in the network with two others in Western Australia and the Northern Territory.

The $14 million system will look at objects billions of light years away, using them as GPS reference points.

Dr Jim Lovell from the University of Tasmania said the system will be on line in 12 months.

"It's going to be a great leap forward for Australia because at the moment there's only one telescope in Australia that can do that and that's the old one here," he said.

"By having three in a big triangle across the continent we can sort of pin down the continent and start to look at stresses and strains, look for signs of earthquake risk, hopefully ultimately look at things like sea level rise."